Dark Souls

[Mad Godji]

Just discovered this on reddit...

https://www.reddit.com/r/DarkSouls2/comments/55l9ng/whats_the_general_awareness_on_stun_riposting/

....not exactly game changing but, interesting and potentially advantageous info for anyone playing through using a 2H weapon and looking to have an easier time of it vs certain mobs. Big attack = stun on certain enemies = follow-up attack is riposte = dead enemy in most cases. Really useful info for Loyce Knight farming in the Old Chaos if you're doing that sort of thing.

Nice trick, I didn't know about it, though it seems to be of rather limited use : it takes the right enemies to get stunned by the attack (i.e. between enemies hich get knocked down and enemies which just ignore the hit), and the right weapon which must have a knockdown attack AND recover fast enough to riposte.


Still, I love still being able to learn stuff like this in a game after three runs

[Darkness]

It's a weird niche advantage certain weapons (mostly the 2H UGS sized types) have under specific circumstances that is, actually, more advantageous than the knockdown. Could greatly speed up the farming of Loyce souls.

[Darkness]

Killed the Guardian Dragon 30 times to get enough dragon scales for the Dragon Remnants covenant.

Or so I thought.

See, I thought I needed 30 scales for the 3rd rank from my reading of the DS2 wiki on Fextralife. Turning in 10 gets me rank 1. When I turn in 20 its rank 2 and 30 for rank 3. But, nooooo. The scales needed are additive not cumulative. I need to farm 30 more dragon scales (well 28 now), to get the final rank and the Black Dragon Greatsword. As I mostly suck at PvP, that means the Guardian Dragon is going down 30 more times.

Or at least it would be, but I don't have enough bonfire ascetics to farm it 30 more times. I've got, like, 14 of them. So I need to acquire 14 more of those to complete my farming.

Ah well, at the end of that process I'll have buffed my stats to the point where the rest of the content should be a breeze and I'll be at the point where I'm effectively multi-classing.

The big plus side is to take a break from all the dragon/bonfire farming, I went to the aerie to farm for the black dragon sword from one of the knights there. Managed to get it drop on the fourth or fifth attempt. So I'm well happy with that.

[Mad Godji]

While it's a rare drop, jester helm + prisoner set parts + covetous golden serpent ring +1 or +2 and the occasional rusted coins should allow you to just farm them from the guards in Dragon Sanctum.

[Darkness]

My experience is that the drop rate is so low its not worth the hassle and farming scales from the guards just isn't fun. I tried on my NG playthrough and quickly got bored.

[Darkness]

Played a bit of Bloodborne and also Dark Souls 1 last night.

On the latter, I just wanted to make a little bit of progress on my Baldur Side Sword using Dex build. One shotted the Gaping Dragon and cut its tail off. Compared to my first time fighting this boss, it seemed unusually easy. Previously it would annihilate both phantoms and then proceed to be on me like white on rice. This time, it went easy on the phantoms and seemed quite content to stare away into the middle distance whilst I hacked at its tail. Odd.

I then died going into Blightown. I understand this is normal.

I just find it hard to get enthused about DS1. Compared to DS2, the controls and the game feel "floaty" and doesn't feel as solid or as visceral as DS2. Its going to be a long haul for me to get to the end of DS1.

Bloodborne, I'm slowly getting to grips with. Its faster paced than DS2 and DS1 and in many respects, more forgiving than either. The game encourages you to remain on the offensive, especially if you take damage, where retaliation provides a brief window in which to recover lost health. The game world is gorgeously rendered but, I find the colour palette decidedly bland compared to DS1 and incredibly bland compared to DS2.

Mechanically, it is more forgiving than DS2 (by miles) and DS1 (by yards), with the game providing you with DS3 and DS1 style dodging and stamina reserves, a much easier parry system and making it much easier to get counter attacks in for big damage. This said, of the two bosses I've face so far, one has been a fairly standard souls fare beast (Cleric Beast) which was easily dispatched and the other (Father Gascoigne) I've had three attempts at and I'm making progress on defeating. Father Gascoigne is a very different fight to anything I'm used to in a souls game. An equally fast, humanoid opponent. Sadly, the fight feels a little "unfair" in that the boss can use weapons identical to the player in a way that is wholly inconsistent with how the player can use them. Plus shitty camera angles. These are mild niggles though, because it is still a fun fight.

However, the camera angles are more frustrating than those of DS1 and DS2. The rich, detailed world, frequently obscures my view when I'm dodging around something,

[Mad Godji]

Ha! I'm actually re-doing a Bloodborne run with a friend currently


I'm having a hard time deciding whether I agree with your assessment of BB being more forgiving than other Souls games. There is a good chance the rally mechanism (getting life back if you hit something just after being hit) will get you killed trying to press attack when you should retreat at least as often as it saves you, high risk high reward is a very dangerous proposal in Souls games
I'd say you're more likely just benefitting from your experience playing the other Souls games : I started with BB myself, and found both DS and DS II trivial compared to how I struggled with some area in Bloodborne*. And re-running BB now, I'm crushing and one-trying just about everything, including bosses I really struggled with during my first two runs.


Discussion to be continued though, you're not even out of the first area yet, I'll let you keep on forming your opinion further.




*But for DS II dlcs. Those were indeed exceedingly harsh experiences.

[Darkness]

I agree its early days but, one of the things I quickly learned was not to be afraid of large packs of mobs, as it is entirely possible to just mow through them. You wouldn't be doing that on DS2 on your first playthrough, you'd be dead.  But, I'll see how I go in the later areas.

My impression of the first two bosses is that they are tougher than those of DS2, presuming they get more difficult as the game goes on. There wasn't that kind of linear progression in DS2, where one of the games toughest bosses was early on and some of the later bosses were just cheese.

[Mad Godji]

I agree its early days but, one of the things I quickly learned was not to be afraid of large packs of mobs, as it is entirely possible to just mow through them. You wouldn't be doing that on DS2 on your first playthrough, you'd be dead.  But, I'll see how I go in the later areas.

Ah, yes, that is indeed a major difference, in DS you just about never want to engage more than one enemy at once, in Bloodborne the game is actually built and rythmed so that it is a perfectly normal situation. Out of curisosity, which weapon are you using so far ?


Gascoigne is indeed a pretty tough boss to manage so early in the game. As you pointed out, nothing in previous games have prepared you to this kind of high-paced fight. But it's mostly a matter of not being familiar with BB combat rythm yet. Typically, while some bosses remain tough even after a few runs, Gascoigne is one you struggle with the first time, and will crush when re-trying it after having gone though the game.
As for boss difficulty, progression is not really linear, there will be fights easier than Gascoigne is, but yes, much worse is to be encountered too

[Darkness]

Ah, yes, that is indeed a major difference, in DS you just about never want to engage more than one enemy at once, in Bloodborne the game is actually built and rythmed so that it is a perfectly normal situation.

But, Bloodborne also allows you to use stealth in a way that the DS games didn't. So your tactical options for engaging foes in melee are broader than those of DS but, you don't have the option to snipe foes from range.

Out of curisosity, which weapon are you using so far ?

I'm liking the Saw Cleaver but, I have the trick Axe and also the Kirk Hammer. Of the three, the Saw Cleaver I like the moveset of most but the range of Axe when transformed is epic.
My parry weapon is the pistol.

Gascoigne is indeed a pretty tough boss to manage so early in the game. As you pointed out, nothing in previous games have prepared you to this kind of high-paced fight. But it's mostly a matter of not being familiar with BB combat rythm yet. Typically, while some bosses remain tough even after a few runs, Gascoigne is one you struggle with the first time, and will crush when re-trying it after having gone though the game.

Yes, the rhythm is the noticeable thing. Between my first and second attempts, I made much more progress getting used to the pace of the fight. I still find it irritating that he can use his blunderbuss in phase 2.